WELLINGTON.

Otago Witness, Issue 560, 23 August 1862, Page 8

WELLINGTON.

{prom otm special correspondent.) "Wellington, August 13. Yesterday's proceedings, after a few enquiries of no great importance, were opened and closed hy the Treasurer in a speech of about four hours' duration. It might be represented rather as an effective review of our past and present position, than as a delineation of the manner in which the large demands on the public purse are to be met • but still there was that £8,000,000 loan, by the Colony for the Northern Island to be eventually met by the Provinces composing it— which is apparently the key-stone of the future poliry The Treasurer, than whom there does not exist a harder- working man, and one who works to a more successful end, has had only a week amid the pressure of other business to master his subject, and be has succeeded ; but he was restrained from fully meeting the case by a sense of the impropriety of developing the policy of the Government not yet quite matured, but which will be expounded on Tuesday next. So that the speech might be justly regarded as an able financial review rather than a; Treasurer's exposition of his fl ways and means.

Hie evening was a '• review" day— devoted to one of those scientific conversations in which the Assembly delights, under the able leadership of the « manner for Ellesmere," Mr. Fitzgerald. The subject for discussion was the "Nominated Superintendent's Act ; » and it was handled by the mover in a speech which you listen to with pleasure, because the speaker is ble^ed with very considerable growers of oratory, and a mind stored with first principles and historical recollections • but it is impossible to hear him address the House without a conviction that he is confiding to the magic influence of his eloquence ; impracticability and often a present undesirability, undeniably stamp his measures. The whole affair was settled beforehand. Those who on the occasion had no minds of their own or who were disposed, as the maiden of fifty to yield to the first solicitation, had been reckoned -and in the language of the House it was said that "noses had been counted," and the result would be an affirmative vote for the second reading The motion was seconded by a member from Taranaki, Mr. Watt— who read the appendix to the Constitution Act in a voice that was not heard in the galleries.

The motion was going by default, when the Superintendent of Otago, Major Richardson, arrested the fatai blow — which, would have acknowledged the principle— by assuring the House that he was not yet prepared for decapitation ; but when the hour was come he was willing that the people, to whom a great constitutional privilege had been granted by the Queen, should decide ■whether they would hold or restore it. The bill was hastily analysed ; and it was made manifest that a Superintendent nominated by a ministry existing perhaps on sufferance by the usual majority of one (for evidently " Governor in Coun•il" is meantby'&overnorj"), would be only trane..erring the power from the people to a General Government Ministry and would be made the engine of political action. It was shown that such a Superintendent, receiving his "instructions'' from the Governor in Council could not act harmoniously with the Executive of the Province ; and, also, that, with reference to the last clause, the principle involved would defeat the object of the promoters of the bill— tor the people never willingly resign power. ' When the hour for our present institutions passing away has come, the tune

will «yen have arrived for their being changed for those more in conformity with an advanced position. Then t ! ie whole m tchiuery will undergo review, but the present l.'nmout'is exceedingly inopportune, when the whole of our energies are required to establish, on a firm and safe basis our connection with the mother country, now in ;i very dangerous position. Mr. Fox, the Ex-Colonial Secretary, supported the shelving of the bill, by seconding the formal resolution t!mfc ifc be read a second time this day six months, reserving his speech to a later period in the debate. Several speakers addressed the House. Mr. Nelson and two or three others whom I could not see from the gallery, and Mc-srs. Moo.'h mse and Ward iv opposition to it, both efioctively. The debate was then adjourned till Monday, to enable two or three Bills to advance a sta^e, the Upper House bein? ravenous, and therefore the " Massacre of the Innocents " is postponed. Even now it is said, that reason _is resuming tier sway. That if the second reading is carried from a desire to avoid the unpleasant retrograde movement, when noses and opinions are on tliitjreut sides, the Bill will be so mutilated in committee, that its mover will sin-ink appalled from the claims of the orphan child lookiug out for adoption. The Attoniey-Geueraf moved the second reading of the Representative Bill, and the Miner's Franchise Bill ; the former giving four member* to Otago, which will pass, and the 1 ittcr gning tlie miners two mimbcis to the A-seinb!v, and recalling their power of vetiii" as miners for the Hupcriutendeucy, leaving them to take out the usual qualification, which the purchase of a quarter acie section in a township, will enable them to do. It would have parsed the second reading at once, but wns arrested by the member for ElieMiurc, who pounced upon it by a (ell „\jop, earnestly entreating that it might be left for his morrow's meal, humorously' as>crting that he w.is so alarmed that if pressed he would vote for the omission of all words, after the 2nd Clause, which repeals the former law, giving the electoral right. If he fails in his'opposition, lie .-.-ill u<-c the lecognition of the right to inti.iducca Maori fia'.chise of a peculiar kind. I suppose on the ground*, that hy their late physical exhibition the Maorics muv by a figure of speech, be eon-ileied " digger.-." "That honorable member, to whose manly'eioquence the House delimits to listen, Ins much' to answer for —to day he " elevates' 1 Miiories to a future proeminence; next da> slaughters the '• innocents"— then follows, out of pur*} democratic attiietion, a din at the miners and on Tuesday next I fully expect that the House will see thelnip rial Government, with the Duke of Newoaatlo in tlie fore, pitchforked in a mo^t merciless manner, symbolical of cur barbaums tendencies.

As was justly said by the proposer of the amendment, the times are out of joint, the organ of destrucliveuess is rampant, that of constructiveness has cnil.tpsed into a valley. This is a time requiring the utmost circumspection to rebuild the tottering fabric, and the House is engaged in pottering about the foundations, which have evinced no indications of un«ouud'iess.. Truly may it be said that " While Rome was burning, Nero fiddled." I sometimes f,uicy I su; written on the walls of the House, by an umeen hand Mene, Afrne, Tckd Upharsin. Shortly, if the current .rumours be correct, the ciy will arise " To your tents, O Israel." Already the members for Auckland Ion? iV the flesh-pots of their Egypt, while those iiom the Southern Islands long to embrace tlie pledges of affection which cluster around their hearths, and it is by no means improbable that the real work of the House will be pei formed by that sturdy few who, from conscientious principles, sit grimly in the House, when the dull and dreary details ot a Law Bill require an attendance; a curious prying eye could often have counted out the House, and that with but a slight acquaintance with the simplest arithmetical knowledge.